Day 81

[from Pokémon xTreme]

Brandon knocked smartly on the door of the breeder's house. "Hey Ellen, you in?" he called out. "It's me, Brandon!"

A moment later, the door opened, revealing a slightly flustered-looking woman with messy black hair. She had on a sky-blue T-shirt with "KEEP CALM AND SOFT RESET" printed on it, and a pair of smart white pants. She seemed to be clutching a handful of shining white stones. "Sorry for the wait, I'm up to my knees in Skitty right now," she said, her voice quick and skittish. "Some guy over in Sinnoh wants a shiny male and I'm like, "yeah, good luck with that", but he's paying me a lot for it, so… anyway, what can I do for you?"

Brandon waved a hand at Taylor. "Remember I was gonna do that mentoring thing? Well, this is who I'll be mentoring. I figured you were the best place to come to to get her a starter Pokémon, so… yeah. Seth's here too with his kid that he's mentoring."

"I see," said Ellen, nodding. She held out the hand not holding the stones. "Well, it's nice to meet you. I'm Ellen, I'm a friend of Brandon's."

"I'm Taylor," said Taylor, shaking Ellen's hand. Her shake was a little too energetic. "It's, uhh… nice to meet you."

"I need to use the PC for something," said Brandon, "so while I do that, could you go with Taylor and look for a Pokémon with her? Thanks."

"Sure, it's not like I'm totally rushed off my feet or anything," said Ellen sarcastically.

Taylor could sense the sarcasm in Ellen's voice, but Brandon clearly didn't, for he quickly said, "Thanks, Ellen," and darted off inside the house.

Ellen sighed. "For a world-class trainer, he sure is an asshole," she grumbled as Brandon ran off. "But I guess I don't have a choice now. Come on inside for a moment, I gotta go put these Shiny Stones away and then we can look for a Pokémon for you."

Taylor nodded and followed Ellen inside, closing the door behind her. The house was rather messy and cluttered, with boxes and items scattered around all over the place. As they entered the kitchen, Taylor saw that there appeared to be a Pokémon egg being incubated in the microwave, with another two sat nearby in actual incubators. A number of evolutionary stones were scattered across the dining table, and Ellen set the Shiny Stones down upon it before turning her attention back to Taylor.

"Okay, so, I have hundreds of Pokémon here at the ranch," explained Ellen. "Most of them have Egg moves, most of them have pretty decent Natures, and pretty much all of them have perfect IVs. Of course, I don't know which Pokémon has what, because there's so many of them around, but yeah, if you see a Pokémon you like, point it out, and I'll have a look and see what it has in terms of moves and stuff. If you still like it, then it's yours."

Taylor had only understood about half of this, but she got the gist: if she found a Pokémon she liked, she could have it. She nodded. "Okay."

"Alright, let's get back outside and have a look, then," said Ellen. "Brandon can catch up once he's done with whatever the hell it is he needs a PC so desperately for."

 "Needs to make room in his party for Seth's Zapdos," Taylor explained, as they headed back towards the front door. "They keep betting over it or something."

"Yeah, that's right, they do," said Ellen, nodding. "So what stupid thing were they betting over this time? Because it's usually something stupid with them. They weren't racing here on their Pokémon with you two on their backs, were they? If so, I apologize."

Taylor nodded sadly. "That's exactly what they were doing," she said. "I'm really not looking forward to having to fly back on that thing."

"Don't worry, they're both really rather excellent at flying when they're not going hell-for-leather," said Ellen. "Considering Brandon specializes in Flying-types, you'd really rather hope he's an excellent flyer, wouldn’t you?"

"Have you flown with them before, then?" asked Taylor, as they passed through the front door and stepped back into the extensive garden.

"A few times," said Ellen. "Alright, like I said, you're free to pick any Pokémon you like, but you'll want to check its IVs, Nature and moves first, to make sure they're what you want."

"I guess," said Taylor, who still wasn't sure what any of that actually meant. "Okay then… let's see…"